It depends of the size of the quilt and how intricate my quilting patterns are.
Several years ago I made a wholecloth 75"x75" and I took me about 1000 hours. The one I do now will need about 600-700. Of course you can spend more or less! Time is not so important for me, the process of quilting is what I like most.

yes it takes a long time but if you love the action it is worth it good luck try a lap siz first---macine quilting is just practice+practice i am still at the practice stage but seeing some improvement

I have handquilted for a long time; for a queen/king size it
takes me a couple months. I quilt a few hours most evenings
and more on weekends. I have never kept track of the exact
hours. Then again, once or twice on each quilt I have to lay it aside for a few days while my fingers heal. For me,I find that Zinc Oxide Ointment helps me heal more than anything else I've tried. Don't find it at Walmart, but our local drug store carries it. One time I found it in the 'baby' section...it is suppose to be good for diaper rash. When hand quilting a large quilt, it does seem like
a long time, but that is my favorite part of quilting. If you just quilt 15 or 20 minutes here and there, you will be surprised how that time accumulates.

I did a lap size one, I think it was something like 48 x 52, in about 2 months. Not sure what sort of hours that would be as the time spent at any one time varied from a few minutes to a couple hours or so. And I did not work on it every day either. Also I do not do very dense quilting.

i went into a shop one time for some advice an a quilting pattern for an orphan quilt top i had rescued. the shop owner told me...if you sit and quilt for one hour a day you can have a queen size quilt done in a year...wow, really? i went home, loaded up the quilt and machine quilted it in about 6 hours....i don't have any idea if she was right...just hearing that was enough for me to say..." never mind"...i am way to impatient to even consider that.
i have hand quilted plenty since that fateful day...and i do not believe it would have taken me that long...in my mind at least i'm fairly fast.
remember as you go along and get into the rhythm of it you pick up speed and if will take less and less time to quilt your quilt.

i haven't computed the hours either. The GFG that i just finished (full size) took me almost 5 months exactly. Started it after school started and i generally quilt when i'm home and more on the weekends. I will add that i don't have kids or others demanding on my time - and if i don't eat, that's ok, too...No one else to feed, cept the cat & she's easy!

I don't keep track of hours, but I only spend about an hour a night hand quilting, and a little more time on the weekends. The quilt I'm finishing up now was started in December, 2009, and it's 85 inches square. I thought I was done, but I'm adding a little bit more hand quilting in the border.

As far as I'm concerned, it's quality time that I spend with myself. I listen to music or books on tape, or I plan the next quilt. I'm not in a rush to finish lots of quilts.

I'm a hand quilter. I used to work on them faithfully but got off track.
Well, I have one that's been in progress several years but was put away. I took it out and started working on it a little bit each day. The little bit turns into many stitches over time and now it's about 3/4 done!!!
Someone on the board suggested 15 minutes a day and I committed to it but have done much more. This time of year is a great time for evening quilting :)

I've just started practicing my hand quilting and I love it. I would love to get good enough to do a quilt that I hand pieced this year. But I am not sure if you trace the whole quilting pattern on the fabric at once or in small sections as you quilt. Any suggestions out there from all you seasoned hand quilters? I would love to be as good as y'all are. Practice, practice, practice right?